Veteran's Day is coming

We've already had our parade here in Columbus, but November 11 is the actual day we honor our veterans. I hope to find a few new photos.

But today I came across this story again, "World War II Rescue of Prison Ship Survivors" and it was as interesting as when I first linked to it in 2005--maybe more so as people psychologize a mass murderer at Ft. Hood, and weep for and provide free legal services for the detainees at Gitmo who are too vicious to be released either to their home countries or our prisons set up for run-of-the-mill criminals.

Aside from having been in the water for four days without any food and practically nothing to drink, these men had been slaves in the Malay Peninsula for three years, since Singapore fell, and they themselves were in no darn physical shape to withstand any hardships, so our immediate problem was to get them below and get them in a bunk and give them some food. We did that - prepared some soup and broth for them - I remember that night we gave them some bread, it was the first white bread they had had in three years. We gave them some broth, warm water, tea, and they were still very active all that night - we finished recovering them just about dark, and all that night they were very active, talked, told us stories of how their ships had been sunk in a convoy, and how thankful they were, and about their life in the Army beforehand. But next morning, when we went down to look at them, boy, they were really tired out, there wasn’t a one of them rolling around a bit, it had been quite a mental strain and they keeled over completely.

The story they told us was that they, some of them, hadn’t even been in the Army two weeks and they were shot right up to Singapore to reinforce the garrison up there. After they got there, about three days, Singapore fell and they were taken prisoners, put up into various parts of the Malay Peninsula, and their most recent job had been to build a railroad down the Peninsula. They, all during this time, had suffered quite a few hardships. They had no food that they were used to at all, they had rice only. They had practically no medical care, they had no clothes, they all went barefooted. Everyone of them on board had malaria, most of them had pellagra, beriberi, bad cases of scurvy, and then they had salt-water sores on them that they got when they were in the water before being recovered. Our pharmacist’s mate was really faced with a problem, he had to make immediate inspection of all of them to find anybody who had serious injuries that he could fix up and then he had to slowly work through the rest of the crowd and fix up the little scratches and bruises and cuts and things like that, which he did. We were running sort of short of medical supplies too, I know, we didn’t have enough gauze or bandage to take care of these 73 men. About 10 or 12 cases were critical. We had to put them in bunks in the after battery with a special nursemaid - they were actual bad patients, where to others, boy, you should have seen them stacked up back there. We put two in each bunk and four in each torpedo rack in the after torpedo room and we were very profusely apologizing for the lack of space we had to offer them and they were very profusely saying, “That’s all right, you should have seen the space we’ve been living in,” because they said that they use to just stack them in the these troop-transports, everywhere they would go; when they would ride in trucks anywhere, they would just stack them in like bundles, and then didn’t mind this little space at all.

What CNN calls investigative reporting

Supposedly, this is "drilling down" for the real Ft. Hood story. An account of a visit to the facility in June. What's he looking for? Stress, people waiting in lines, medical exams. No wonder Fox scoops them on everything. What a snooze.

And Bob Greene rambles on and on about fog.

And could the shooter have been suffering from "vicarious traumatisation?" HLN's Christi Paul talks with a psychologist about why the Ft. Hood gunman, a psychiatrist, couldn't see he needed help. "I know cardiologists who smoke!" says the doc in trying to explain why someone would do irrational things. Yes, Anything but the obvious, folks.

Neal Boortz and Carrington Automotive Enterprises

I've never heard talker Neal Boortz, but an interesting, not-credited story about the Carrington Automotive Enterprises employees' meeting turned up in my mailbox today. I always research these things if they have a smidgen of truth, and find that if they are travelling at the speed of light in blogdom, there's a good chance the attribution is incorrect or fictional. This one was fictional, but it came from Boortz' column where he confirms it is a story or parable told to point out a truth. Here it is, Just a little company get together

"Carrington Automotive Enterprises is what we call a Sub-S - a Subchapter S corporation. The name comes from a particular part of our tax code. Sub-S status means that the income from all 12 of our stores is reported on my personal tax return. Businesses that report their income on the owner's personal tax return are referred to as "small businesses." So, you see now that this $534,000 is really the total taxable income - the total combined profit from all 12 of our stores. That works out to an average of a bit over $44,000 per store.

Why did I feel it important for you to see my actual 2008 tax return? Well, there's a lot of rhetoric being thrown around today about taxes, small businesses and rich people. To the people in charge in Washington right now I'm a wealthy American making over a half-million dollars a year. Most Americans would agree: I'm just another rich guy; after all ... I had over a half-million in income last year, right? In this room we know that the reality is that I'm a small business owner who runs 12 retail establishments and employs 187 people. Now here's something that shouldn't surprise you, but it will: Just under 100 percent ... make that 99.7 percent of all employers in this country are small businesses, just like ours. Every one of these businesses reports their income on a personal income tax return. You need to understand that small businesses like ours are responsible for about 80 percent of all private sector jobs in this country, and about 70 percent of all jobs that have been created over the past year. You also need to know that when you hear some politician talking about rich people who earn over $200,000 or $500,000 a year, they're talking about the people who create the jobs." . . .

"Right now the Democrats are pushing a nationalized health care plan that, depending on who's doing the talking, will add anywhere from another two percent to an additional 4.6 percent to my taxes. If I add a few more stores, which I would like to do, and if the economy improves, my taxable income ... our business income ... could go over one million dollars! If that happens the Democrats have yet another tax waiting, another five percent plus! I've really lost track of all of the new government programs the Democrats and President Obama are proposing that they claim they will be able to finance with new taxes on what they call "wealthy Americans."

And while we're talking about health care, let me explain something else to you. I understand that possibly your biggest complaint with our company is that we don't provide you with health insurance. That is because as your employer I believe that it is my responsibility to provide you with a safe workplace and a fair wage and to do all that I can to preserve and grow this company that provides us all with income. I no more have a responsibility to provide you with health insurance than I do with life, auto or homeowner's insurance. As you know, I have periodically invited agents for health insurance companies here to provide you with information on private health insurance plans. The Democrats are proposing to levy yet another tax against Carrington in the amount of 8 percent of my payroll as a penalty for not providing you with health insurance. You should know that if they do this I will be reducing every person's salary or hourly wage by that same 8 percent. . . "

"Let's be clear about this ... crystal clear. Any federal tax increase on me is going to cost you money, not me. Any new taxes on Carrington Automotive will be new taxes that you, or the people I don't hire to staff the new stores I won't be building, will be paying. Do you understand what I'm telling you? You've heard about things rolling downhill, right? Fine .. then you need to know that taxes, like that other stuff, roll downhill. . . "

"Most Americans don't realize that when the Democrats talk about raising taxes on people making more than $250 thousand a year, they're talking about raising taxes on small businesses. The U.S. Treasury Department says that six out of every ten individuals in this country with incomes of more than $280,000 are actually small business owners. About one-half of the income in this country that would be subject to these increased taxes is from small businesses like ours. Depending on how many of these wonderful new taxes the Democrats manage to pass, this company could see its tax burden increase by as much as $60,000. Perhaps more."

Read the whole thing--truth is stranger than fiction, and in this case, fiction is truth.

HT Bill L.

I looked at Boortz's bio, and in addition to being a libertarian and a lawyer, he says this as his creds for knowing something about small business: "During his 40 years in talk radio Neal managed to find other things to do to supplement his meager talk radio income. Prior to practicing law Neal could be found working as a jewelry or carpet buyer, selling life and casualty insurance, loading trucks, slinging mail at the post office, working in an employment office, writing speeches for the Governor of Georgia and auditing the books overnight at a sleazy motel. Neal was 47 years old before he ever had less than two jobs. At his peak he had six."

Sand animation--Ukraine's got talent

I think I got carpal tunnel just watching her. What an amazing story she tells with her art.

He probably wishes now he'd married her

He's called her "partner," and seems to be the father of her children. Now she's maybe worth millions.

Beautiful Malice has been sold in more than 20 countries and is scheduled to be translated into at least 13 languages. Not bad for a book that was initially rejected by every literary agency in Australia.

"They said it wasn't sellable as young adult fiction," James said.

The $1 million is scheduled to be paid in four instalments over the next couple of years. The British literary agency C&W will take a cut of 20 per cent.

Link

Liberal media checks the pulse of conservative first

Newsweek's blog is checking all the conservatives sites to see if any are offering crazy, anti-islamic thoughts about the Ft. Hood shootings. The one that makes the most sense and nails the libs perfectly isn't exactly argued with, only quoted--Victor Davis Hanson who argues that Americans' understanding of Islamic terror has not progressed in the last eight years and needs to be updated.

In other words, the narrative after 9/11 largely remains that Americans have given in to illegitimate "fear and mistrust" of Muslims in general. A saner approach would be to acknowledge that there is a small minority of Muslims who channel generic Islamist fantasies, so that we can assume that either formal terrorist plots or individual acts of murder will more or less occur here every three to six months.

And then there's the issue I raised yesterday after watching Obama's press conference in disbelief

The National Review's Jonah Goldberg poses perhaps the most interesting political question, wondering aloud about Obama's slow response to the shootings yesterday, and questions whether Obama's famed coolness could become a political liability by coming across as aloof and uncaring.

I haven't found their assessment of the liberal media--the ones who don't use the M word.

Sure sounds like a terrorist act

He killed American soldiers in the name of Allah. What's that sound like to you?

FORT HOOD, Texas -- The base commander at Fort Hood says soldiers who witnessed a shooting rampage that left 13 people dead reported that the gunman shouted "Allahu Akbar!" before opening fire at the Texas post.

Lt. Gen. Robert Cone told NBC's "Today" show on Friday that suspected shooter, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, made the comment, which is Arabic for "God is great!" before the rampage Thursday that also left 30 people wounded.

Military officials say they are still piecing together what may have pushed Hasan, an Army psychiatrist trained to help soldiers in distress, to turn on his comrades.

Cone says Hasan was not known to be a threat or risk.

Hasan was shot four times during the rampage. Cone says he is hospitalized in stable condition and that military officials will interrogate him as soon as possible.Link.

It will take awhile for the truth of the others stories about him to be checked out, but someone should have blown the whistle on him a long time ago--he was either a complete wacko, or an enemy sympathizer, or a terrorist--or all three.

Neighbors report he had begun wearing Arabic clothing in recent weeks.

And out-birthing the birthers, and the 9/11 conspirators (Bush did it), here's the conspiracy theory--Hasan was a patsy to gin up support for the war in the Middle East.

Police woman Sergeant Kimberly Munley on routine duty brings down the shooter.

Is it hate yet?

Eleven black women have been murdered by Anthony Sowell (I'm not even going to say allegedly since he buried them in his back yard) in Cleveland. Sowell was released from prison after serving 15 years for attempted rape. Given his current crime streak, I'm guessing that charge was a plea bargain for doing something a lot more serious. So I'm wondering, were these hate crimes? Did he speak hate speech before he strangled and raped them? If Sowell were white, or the women were lesbians, someone might call them that. But these days, even the grossest, most heinous crimes must be politically correct--unless of course, we've lumped the victim and the perp in the same box. President Obama jumped the gate immediately when his black Harvard friend was stopped by police for breaking into his own home and refusing to show ID when asked, but the murder of 11 Cleveland women doesn't deserve a peep because the perp wasn't white.

Fourteen women are missing within the city's 4th district. A victim advocate group and a councilman are demanding an investigation. It's a little late for those women, but maybe it will remind people--both relatives (who don't report them missing) and police--that even druggies and prostitutes deserve someone to care and a resolution of the crime that killed them, if for no other reason than to get the creep off the streets.

Michael Belkin has written a number of articles on this crime and others, and in today's WSJ had an article about Tonia Carmichael whose body was identified.

My millionaire foreign relatives are dropping like flies

I get some version of this several times a week.

I am a Diplomat, named WXYZ Scummbag, mandated to deliver your inheritance to you in your country of residence The funds total US$7.5 Million and you were made the beneficiary of these funds by a benefactor whose details will be revealed to you after handing over the funds to you in accordance with the Agreement I signed with the benefactor when he enlisted my assistance in delivering the funds to you. I am presently at JFK Airport in the United States of America and before I can deliver the funds to you, you have to reconfirm the following information so as to ensure that I am dealing with the right person 1.Full Name..............2.ResidentialAddress..........3..Age........4.Occupation...........5.Direct Telephone Numbers....................6.A Copy Of Your Identification.............After verification of the information with what I have on file,I shall contact you so that we can make arrangements on the exact time I will be bringing your package to your residential address.Send the requested information so that we can proceed.

Regards, WXYZ Scummbag

Increasingly, the names are not African, but European. Someone is getting a bit smarter, but not by much.

What's that smell?

Last night for dinner we had steak, fresh beets, tossed salad, and cranberry cream (low sugar) pie (cooked the fresh cranberries with about a TBSP of orange juice, sprinkled it with Splenda, tossed in some walnuts, mashed it, and added a carton of sugar free Cool-Whip when it had cooled). Then we went to Bible Study (Pastor's Notebook) at church. When we walked in about 8 p.m. I said, "That's odd. It smells like sauerkraut in here. What's that smell?" "Don't smell anything," he said reaching for the TV remote.

This morning I was trying to remember where I'd stashed those little packaged handwipes, and checked under the kitchen sink. WHOA!! I found it. There was a small bag of turnips that had been covered up and forgotten. Amazing how much a rotten turnip smells like rotten cabbage. Are they in the same family?

What is environmental justice?

It’s “reparations” all dressed up in high heel sneakers and combat boots, ready to kick butt, and for starters it‘s just a million dollars for a tiny down payment to blacks for slavery--the real goal is global.

“The goals of the [EPA] Environmental Justice Grant Funding Program are to help communities understand and address environmental challenges and create self-sustaining, community-based partnerships focused on improving human health and the environment. Past projects have focused on issues including exposure to toxins, farm worker pesticide protection, mercury in fish, indoor air quality, drinking water contamination, and pollution from shipping ports.

In addition to the traditional criteria, EPA is encouraging applications that address the disproportionate impacts of climate change in communities by emphasizing climate equity, energy efficiency, renewable energy, local green economy, and green jobs capacity building.” Link to Obama‘s new and improved and much more radical EPA”

We’re from the government. We’re here to make you understand.

Gone, but not forgotten, Van Jones [moved over to John Podesta's building] explains the concept of environmental justice. “If all you have is a clean energy revolution, you haven’t done nothin . . . We want a new system. We‘re gonna change the whole thing. . . That‘s why you were born.”

One man's tool is another man's tax

From AIA [American Institute for Architects] Angle, November 5, 2009

"Three weeks after AIA Board member Mickey Jacob, FAIA, testified before the House Small Business Committee about the AIA's plan to rebuild and renew the economy, the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved legislation designed to help small businesses weather the economic storm.

The Small Business Financing and Investment Act (HR 3854) includes several provisions designed to achieve the goals of the AIA’s Rebuild and Renew Plan for Long-term Prosperity that Jacob unveiled at the hearing. Among other things, the bill would expand eligibility for Business Stabilization Loans established under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) and increase the maximum loan size from $35,000 to $50,000. It also would streamline paperwork for the loans; in his testimony, Jacob cited the extensive amount of paperwork required to access Recovery Act programs and funding.

As the bill was being debated on the House floor, more than 1,000 AIA members contacted their members of Congress and encouraged them to vote in favor of the legislation. The bill eventually passed with wide bipartisan support by a vote of 389-32.

“For small architecture firms, the ability to access short-term lines of credit can mean the difference between survival and liquidation. In this economic crisis, too many firms have faced the horrible choice of having to lay off staff or going without pay in order to keep their doors open,” Jacob told the committee in early October. “Architects aren’t looking for bailouts; they need tools that help them and their clients create jobs through new building projects."

“The Small Business Financing and Investment Act is one key plank in our Rebuild and Renew Plan for Long-term Prosperity. Now Congress and the administration need to ensure a steady flow of credit to the real estate industry and enact policies that empower architects to design livable, sustainable, and vibrant communities," said Andrew Goldberg, Assoc. AIA, senior director, AIA Federal Relations.

During the debate, an amendment was offered that would have stripped the bill of many of its key provisions. The AIA Federal Relations team, while working with the Small Business Committee staff, used the AIA’s vast grassroots network in an effort to defeat the amendment. Within hours, the amendment’s sponsor officially withdrew the amendment.

The bill will now head to the U.S. Senate, and the AIA is organizing a similar grassroots effort to ensure the bill receives bipartisan support and can be signed into law."

And this doesn't begin to count the green bills AIA is supporting. Clap and Trade will kill Ohio's economy--we don't have much sun or wind, and no one seems to want our nuclear plants. Coal, of which we have an abundance and which can be made clean and efficient, has been demonized by the environmentalist earth worshipers. Imagine having to pass out the bacon not only to states but also professions and non-profits, all with "vast grass roots networks." Legislators must go crazy.

Friday Family Photo--The Hit Men

My son dropped off a copy of his new CD yesterday. They really aren't at all violent as the photo would suggest--I think that's a guy thing. They are just a bunch of guys who jam and love music. Would like some "hits" though. My guy is in the middle.

The Impact of Federal Spending on Ohio

Unemployment is soaring--nearing 10%. If this administration had a plan, and some think it does, to take over responsibilities and rights of both the states and the private sector, you could say it's working beautifully. The state's Unemployment Insurance fund is being drained. Ohio, like your state, then seeks federal help. But that comes with strings--ropes and chains that bind, then strangle. Total government expenditures relative to the private economy is called "the government expenditure wedge." The government expenditure wedge is determined by dividing government expenditures by net domestic business output. From the Buckeye Institute's May 2009 report:

"The historic relationship between the growth in the private economy, the size of the government expenditure wedge, and the change in the government expenditure wedge illustrates that increases in government spending relative to the size of the private sector causes a reduction in the overall growth of the economy.

For example, between 1965 and 1983, the government expenditure wedge grew quickly, rising 16.6 percentage points to 49.0%. Growth in the private sector slowed to 2.5% per year.

On the other hand, between 1983 and 1988, growth in the private sector accelerated to 5.1% per year as the government expenditure wedge fell 3.3 points back down to 45.7%.

Consequently, the costs of accepting federal dollars from the ARRA will be a long-term drain on the private sector. The ARRA [American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009] will increase the government expenditure wedge from 49.16% to 52.41% for an overall 3.25% increase. This increase will reduce the growth in real net business output by 2.5%, which translates to a reduction of 1.7 million jobs nationally - of which between 66,400 and 91,200 jobs will be lost in Ohio."

That was May. I think the figure is higher now. So don't you believe that "jobs saved" line as the bullying federal government gives you a wedgie.

Who informs the government?

I was more than a bit surprised to watch the President's and the Congress's reactions to the tragic shootings at Ft. Hood, Texas today. We were watching Fox News which cut away to what we thought was a Presidential news conference. But Obama was talking about something totally different--acknowledging people in the audience, etc., and then apparently someone slipped him a note, and he finally began to address, without a teleprompter, what the rest of the nation already knew. But he knew less than we did (at least those watching Fox), and stumbled and stammered. Don't his people keep him informed? I checked the CNN video which didn't show what we saw. That's ObamaNews, I guess.

Then Fox cut away to an announcement from Congress. They planned to observe a moment of silence and then get back to work on the all important bills for . . . what? Well, at that point, no one really knew (still don't) what happened in Texas. Isn't Ms. Pelosi third in line to be president? Were precautions being taken to protect her? Have they all forgotten that there were multiple targets on 9/11? Or the Virginia Tech shooter? Have they ever heard of diversionary tactics? Let's hope this was only one deranged, disturbed man who had his own personal demons, but you would think until there was a full investigation, our elected officials would be a bit more cautious.

Another epidemic for school children

Big Hollywood has posted more Obama propagandizing. Most of the eleven videos of the indoctrination of children with song, dance and rap lauding our current president have been removed from Big Hollywood. This one was still up when I checked. The transcripts have been included, so even if the videos are removed you can see that children who should be learning to read, write, spell and communicate so they can get good jobs or go to college when the Obama stranglehold over the economy ends, are wasting their time learning propaganda songs like good little members of the Komsomol (Комсомол, short for Коммунисти́ческий сою́з молодёжи, youth wing of the communist party).



Transcript:

We believe in Barack Obama
He loves you and he loves your mama
We believe in Barack Obama, yeah
With all the change he’s building
Gonna bring hope to the children

We believe in Barack Obama, yeah
Change
That we can believe in
Change
That we can believe in
Change
That we can believe in

We believe in Barack Obama
He loves you and he loves your mama
We believe in Barack Obama, yeah
With all the change he’s building
Gonna bring hope to the children

We believe in Barack Obama, yeah
Change
That we can believe in
Change
That we can believe in
Change
That we can believe in
Yeah, haha, haha.

Alright, come on now, here we go;
You know we gotta get Barack and all of his crew
In the White House so they can prove that
In their hearts they know what to do
And that includes Michelle and the kiddies too

[kids chanting]
“There is not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America — there’s the United States of America.”

We believe in Barack Obama
He loves you and he loves your mama
We believe in Barack Obama, yeah
With all the change he’s building
Gonna bring hope to the children
We believe in Barack Obama, yeah
[Chant at end of song – unintelligible]

Afghanistan myths

Victor Davis Hanson, a military historian, reviews them

• it’s not unconquerable or the graveyard of empires
  
• although fierce fighters, they’ve never defeated invaders without outside help
  
• it isn’t ungovernable--had a long period of peace in modern times
  
• we didn’t take our eye off the “good” war--from 2001 to 2007 things were quiet
  
• and finally, it’s not Vietnam

“Is Afghanistan the new Vietnam? Hardly. In the three bloodiest years, 2007 through 2009 so far, the United States has suffered a total of 553 fatalities - tragic, but less than 1 percent of the 58,159 Americans killed in Vietnam. What is astounding is the ability of the U.S. military to inflict damage on the enemy, protect the constitutional government and keep our losses to a minimum.”

Today only Obama’s indecision and confusion stops our military.

“We have experienced soldiers and military leadership, a just cause and Western unity. In other words, we have everything we need to defeat the Taliban -- except a commander-in-chief as confident about fighting and winning as he once was as a candidate.”

Richard's Fear

He writes a blog called Three Score and Ten or More, and sometimes calls himself an old coot. He's seen and done it all--was a Mormon missionary as a young man in Finland, had a career in theater, he's a father, grandfather, husband, handyman, traveler, and writer of a blog. Recently he wrote about fear--with a lead in about things that go bump in the night through out our life times. Every thing from stage fright to jumping out of an airplane. Then he gets to his current fear--for our way of life and country.

"These have always been the kinds of things that I felt were frightening, but they are immediate things, and you either survive them or not (obviously I did). When I say I am frightened, I don’t fear an immediate strike of lightening, but my fear is as vivid, just not as immediate and my fear is not of personal death, but for the death of the type of nation I have come to love.

A number of things which have happened since the election of President Obama which have made me nervous and distrustful, but I never felt an emotion that approached real fear until the administration launched its attack on the Fox News network, (The Fox Network such as it is, holds no special place in my heart) an act, which, if upheld, essentially vitiates any hope we have for freedom of expression, a central focus of our Constitution and our way of life. Political correctness forces have been picking at this freedom for some time, but this is a frontal assault on the core of Bill of Rights. Almost at the same time it was revealed that our country (as one of a group) has endorsed a United Nations resolution that could become law in our country if some have their way, making public speech or criticism of an faith or religious group an international crime (the article I read implies that it identified this form of criticism as a form of terrorism).

The implications are mind boggling and hold more threat to our existence as it is than could be completely imagined.

I was calming down on this subject, but as I sat in our Cardiologist’s office, the President was shown being interviewed by some lady newsperson and his answers to her softball questions were so self convicting of Obama’s feeling that any organized criticism of his programs deserve stifling that my feeling rose again."

He has calmed down some now and recently wrote about avocadoes--still, he reflects the concerns of many.

We the People--it's poetry

We the People of the United States,
in Order to
form a more perfect Union
establish Justice,
insure domestic Tranquility,
provide for the common defence,
promote the general Welfare, and
secure the Blessings of Liberty
to ourselves and our Posterity,
do ordain and establish
this Constitution for
the United States of America.

This book was on the bargain shelf at Barnes and Noble. There's almost no commentary or hoopla. Just the words of the writers. It includes the U.S. Constitution, the Amendments to the Constitution, The Declaration of Independence, The Articles of Confederation, and Common Sense by Thomas Paine. Most of us haven't looked at this since high school when some knowledge was probably required.

By the way, are you smarter than a 1954 eighth grader?

What's wrong with this book?

Nothing that I can see. Here's a review from Amazon by a reviewer who has eclectic tastes and writes frequently.

"The Way Into Torah" is a superbly written, highly accessible introduction for the general reading seeking guidance on how to effectively read, study, and understand the Torah, including the other books of the Bible and the related sacred texts that grew up around it. Norman Cohen is Rabbi and Professor of Midrash at Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion, and brings his expertise and experience to bear in presenting just what the Torah is and how it came about, the different approaches to studying the Torah, the various levels of understanding the Torah, and what the Torah study is an essential aspect of the Jewish experience. The Way Into Torah is an ideal beginning point for commencing a personal study of the Torah.

I checked the publisher, Jewish Lights, and it seems fine as near as I can tell from the other titles in its catalog. The copyright is recent--2000--at least for a religious book, and the Torah is thousands of years old so probably not much has changed. It's part of a 14 volume series, "The Way into. . ." which has many interesting titles. It's not damaged or moldy or water marked. No foxing. There's a smidgen of tomato sauce on the title page, but that might be mine from yesterday's lunch.

I found it in the freebie box at church, but its most recent provenance before it was purchased at a used book sale for $2.00 then donated to our church, was the Upper Arlington Public Library. So, it isn't only Lutherans and Evangelicals they don't like there. I went into the catalog and did a word search on "Torah," and found 2 titles, both for juveniles. Then I did a subject search on "Judaism," and found a hodge podge, bits and snippets. This book was truly needed for some balance and fleshing out of the collection.

Someone who knows more about the range of possibilities for good books on Judaism and its sacred texts needs to go there and review the collection. Not that you'll get far, of course. When I pointed out to them that their most recent book on Lutherans was over 40 years old despite having one of the largest Lutheran churches in the country right here in Upper Arlington, they made a real effort and bought ONE additional title, a collection of essays published in the 21st century. Wow. They're only nice to us when there's a bond issue, so have your list ready early.

Banned Books week is over for this year, but here's my friendly, insider reminder: objectionable books are banned before they ever get to the shelf--it's called book selection in library-speak. But "deacquisition" of one that slipped through is also a useful technique.

Matching thread for my matchy matchy outfit

The other day I mentioned that I'd bought a 3 piece outfit--slacks, sweater, long sleeve shirt--the shade of infant formula spit up at the Discovery shop for $3.00. At that price, I figured I could wear it to exercise class, washing the car or for swimming in Lake Erie. However, the slacks are a bit too long. So I dug around in my mother's sewing cabinet, through Neno's (my husband's grandmother born in 1887) wooden spools and those from the years when I used to sew. No matches for my matchy matchy bargain. I'll have to check with the neighbors. A new spool of thread would probably cost more than the outfit.

4150 OSU students

That doesn't seem like a very high number--on a campus of 50,000+. The weasel word is "chose." I'm guessing several thousand were either busy working, studying or didn't have the opportunity.

OSU now has a fund to provide $500 for a student who has experienced sexual assault or "intimate partner violence." This is to cover things like broken stuff, cell phone with prepaid minutes, emergency housing, help in breaking a lease, court costs, etc. This supplements other funds and insurance for students in distress. "Any OSU student who has alleged to a university official that they have experienced sexual violence can apply for assistance. A police report is not necessary in order to access the funds." Hmmm. There is a list of people--university staff and officials--who are consulted. If the student didn't report anything to the police, does the official have to? Wonder if the parents get to know too? And if he/she returns to the abusive one, do they get a second request for funds?

The Sexual Wellness Program at the Ohio State Student Wellness Center is devoted to promoting safer sex and healthy relationships. This program is home to The Condom Club, which offers condoms to OSU students at an extremely low cost--50 condoms for $5.00 and also access to free oral dams, latex gloves, finger cots and lubricant. Must be going after the GLBT group. And because 44% of the couples who use condoms do so incorrectly, The Center has volunteers called "sexperts" to help with this problem.

I worked with hundreds of student employees over my career at OSU (and U of I)--it was the small town and rural stock that worked the hardest and had the best values. Asian and Indian students were also outstanding, if you could keep them before a higher tech unit snatched them up. 99% were serious about their education and didn't party on week-ends or sleep around. When they graduated, many started at more than I made, but librarianship has always been at the bottom.

Do you suppose there was this much assault, violence, STDs, and abortions for college men and women back in the bad old days of the 40s and 50s when women had hours, didn't share dorms or apartments with men and the doors were locked at an appointed hour? Sometimes fences are more useful than ambulances.

Mind games of conservatives and liberals

One can't remember the past they came from, the other can't figure out the future they're creating despite all the evidence of what's happened in other countries.

If it's one thing that frustrates me about conservatives and Republicans it's their thinking that we used to inhabit some sort of capitalistic, entrepreneurial, free market paradise. We never did and never will. When I hear my peers who've been sucking on the Medicare teat for years, moaning about socialized medicine I'm just gob smacked.

I received a good K-12 education, a bachelor's and master's degree in tax supported institutions. The U.S. and Illinois government and my local town fathers didn't do that to be kind and benign. They figured I was a good bet and would return the favor with more taxes for them. I had pure water, vaccinations, and safe (modified with vitamins and minerals) food courtesy of the government's public health and agriculture programs. The townspeople in the little towns where I lived taxed themselves for the good of the entire community, even those who couldn't pay. Before I was born my blind grandmother got a "pension" which sometimes fed the family.

Even I know who built our interstates and why--I was around then. I know that the biggest recipient of government welfare over the years is agriculture and that I benefit from those prices every time I go to the store (even though I've paid up front through my taxes). Even I know the federal government has been tinkering with the housing market since the great land rushes of the 19th century. I never had a VA or FHA insured loan, but I certainly knew Republicans who did, and I always had a break on my taxes in the days I still had a mortgage. My dad didn't use the GI Bill, going right back to work when he got out of the Marines in 1945, but millions of men bettered themselves on the government's dollar as a pay back for the risks they took, going from farm boy and mechanic to doctor and lawyer. My husband brought home the bacon many times on pork construction projects funded by the U.S. or a state or a local government. My career was in academe--can't get much more government dependent than that!

Even I know that when you do favors for the government, it repays you in kind. My ancestors, who were pacifists and didn't bear arms, supplied the fledgling American government food stuffs (probably would have been taken from them if they hadn't) during the Revolution and were rewarded with land in Ohio before it was a state. One of my ancestors, Michael Danner, was the King's Commissioner of Highways in the colonies and helped to lay out the famous Monocacy Trail; I'm guessing that led to some pretty good perks and he moved on up when Pennsylvania became a state. The same guys who were given land to build the canal system to open up the Midwest to commerce and transportation got to also destroy it for the benefit of railroads, with state and federal favors and help.

But as naive as conservatives seem to be, that's not as frustrating as the blindness of progressive/socialists and Democrats who don't seem to be able to read history. They don't believe that what happened in Nazi Germany (state controls the business owners and uses the proceeds for war), the Soviet Union (state owns business, labor and agriculture and creates famines and misery) and Red China (state murders its own citizens to achieve its economic goals) can happen here--because they're too smart.

The health care take over (don't call that 2,000 page bill a reform), the energy scam under the guise of saving the planet, the holier than thou diversity and multicultural blather that is really about losing our free speech and creating globalism. The huge fortunes that were amassed in energy, commerce and transportation in the 19th and 20th century built with government help were just Al Gore and George Soros doing business today with the phony CO2 credits and cap and trade. It's just harder to see since there's nothing tanglible. There's no there there. Gore's become a millionaire many times over by just doing what Americans have always done--using the government to build their fortune. That is capitalism, American style, dressed up to save the world.

Really, progressives/marxists/democrats are smart people who have lost all sense of both history and the future. Despite all the gun laws they've put in place, they are willing to put a loaded gun to their head and blow out what's left of their brains. Which wasn't much.

Where is my new van?

Is it asking too much? A 2010 Dodge minivan ? Actually, I'd love to be able to reward Ford for staying in the free market and not becoming part of the state automobile industry run by a car czar. But they don't make minivans anymore, plus, even when they did, the seats were horrid.

I've looked at the Chrysler models online, and usually the web page bumps me back to 2009, which is not a good sign. I haven't see a van on a lot in a year (except for used). I do not want to be squished and smashed into a small car where instead of seeing over the traffic at Ohio cornfields I'm looking at mudflaps and dead deer.

My Dodge 2002 is very comfortable and at 26 mpg on the highway I haven't seen anything out there to match it. I suppose my son can keep it running another 10 years (Jack Maxton) but really I'd rather get a 2010.

Have cash will deal. Call me (do I sound like Gleen Beck?). I can give you a good price on a sweet, lovingly cared for, used van with good tires and mileage driven by a little old lady librarian. But I want my new one first.

Putting on the kid gloves for the jobs report

In today's WSJ there's a real sentimental softy worthy of the 2008 campaign coverage on the stimulus and jobs. Louise Radnofsky opens with this grabber:

"The number of jobs the Obama administration credits to federal stimulus money could be overstated by at least 20,000 of the 640,000 claimed, a Wall Street Journal analysis found.

If 20,000 were the only mistake, I'd probably take it. But there's so much more. Did you think when he touted this "recovery" that the money would go for "Head Start" jobs--a program that's been in place for 40 years, absorbing billions of dollars, and has yet to show any academic improvement for minorities, so they've moved the goals to nutrition and health? But according to Ms. Radnofsky, who apparently didn't dig very deep, it was misunderstanding how to report that caused the misreporting. Maybe the directors were victims of their own programs?

But then, what's the excuse for colleges and universities who misreported jobs created and saved, counting part time and work study students as discreet numbers instead of FTEs? And how about those low-income housing landlords, who've been on the federal dole for decades. Do you really think they'd want to show no jobs? How would they get their next installment? And those confusing forms and no accountability? Who designed that, Louise? Was that Bush's fault too? Or the money that went for raises and bonuses. Yes, I suppose you could say it's a job saved--except where would they have gone?

If it clunks like car loan, or crashes like a $8,000 mortgage credit, or bails like a rich bank lobbyist, let's call it what it is. F-A-I-L-U-R-E.

Thomas Frank on Glenn Beck

You've probably never heard of Thomas Frank. He's a "real" journalist--I think. I read him in the WSJ. He also writes for Huff and Puff and NYT, all their opinion all the time. He's really pissed at Glenn Beck, who has a fatter subscription list than the NYT. It's that red phone shtick-- doesn't set well with him, because it's only for the White House and not for Frank's progressive sources. Why not attack the black boards or blue curtains? So he spouts the White House mantra. Beck is odious, Beck is a panic peddler. Beck is (play scary music here) Fox! Through some mysterious, closed-minded reasoning that infects many liberal writers/journalists/bloggers/entertainers, Frank suddenly gets a revelation that "ideas have consequences," which is exactly what Beck says too, but better, and with higher ratings. So here he is, on that side of the fence where only warm fuzzies for Obama grow, lobbing stones at a guy who actually uses the investigative methods that journalists could be, but aren't. Guys like Frank have to play it safe. If they don't, the White House will come after them like they did Fox.

Ohio approves crime and disaster at the polls

They've really got the Obama Flu. He has so dispirited Americans that they seem to think things will never, never get better, so let's bring out of state gambling interests and plump the state coffers with something besides federal pork. Sad story at Columbus Dispatch

Only the people voting NO made any sense at all in their choices:

"Many voters who cast "yes" ballots noted that thousands of Ohioans gamble in other states without benefiting their home state. The casinos would jump-start economic development in the state's largest cities and retain tax money in Ohio, they said.

"I don't go to casinos, but lots of people go elsewhere to gamble, so they might as well keep the money here," said Regina Lee, 35, of Westerville. "We need the tax dollars and the jobs."

Some who voted against Issue 3 cited the potential for crime and other social problems as well as exaggerated promises of jobs from casino proponents.

John Goettler, 45, an Upper Arlington consultant for nonprofit organizations, said he is opposed to expanded gambling in Ohio. He is worried the casinos could bring more crime and other problems and thinks the pro-casino television ads promising thousands of jobs contained "blatant lies."

"As bad as the economy is ... legalizing casino gambling is not the answer," he said.

Ohio voters had rejected gambling issues four times before, including twice in the past three years. Last year, nearly 63 percent of voters rejected a proposal for a casino in Clinton County."

The casino owners and union bosses got out the vote in our already crime ridden, struggling major cities.

"The measure benefited from a strong appeal by unions and urban politicians to get voters in the four casino cities - Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati and Toledo - to the polls. The measure carried by large majorities in the Cleveland and Cincinnati areas, won with a smaller majority in Toledo, and lost in Franklin County."

Our neighbor Detroit has 70,000 abandoned buildings. Doesn't it have casinos bring in billions? One of the pushers set to benefit (besides our former Methodist pastor governor) is Dan Gilbert, owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers and owner-to-be of two of the casinos. And they said Rush Limbaugh was unfit to own an NFL team?

Not a referendum

That's the talking point direct from the White House, why, Gibbsy didn't even stay up to watch. And the media, every one of them, are repeating it right on cue. They know their lines and their role. Actually, I agree. Two governors and a district in NY are hardly a landslide for Republicans/conservatives. Especially since it's hard to get a piece of dental floss between the parties. But if this were 2006 and Bush were in the WH--Oh my, would they be singing spinning a different story.

Flutrina

Tonight we were watching the evening news coverage of the H1N1 vaccine lines here in Columbus. It looked like a miserable day for parents of young children (who stood in line for hours, and probably didn't get to the polls). "Do you remember your small pox vaccination?" I asked. He didn't. I do. We lined up at school and got it from a nurse. Same for the polio vaccine in 1955. In a town of less than 3,000 that probably had 2 doctors and a few RNs. If they could do it in the 40s and 50s, with Truman and Eisenhower in charge, what in the world is wrong with this bunch of clowns who want to take over, not just shots for a disease that may be blown out of proportion by the media, but health care for the whole nation?

"So here you have it, a dry run for the Obama Administration’s performance on nationalized health care. All vast governmental forces were focused on a single disease rather than the entire gamut of America’s health care problems. There was no greedy, profit–riddled private sector in this fight, only the saintly public option. The program had universal coverage and no pre–existing condition exclusions.

The result? Missed deadlines, rationing, incompetence, blame–shifting, arbitrary decisions, random displays of authority and don’t forget: long lines.

There’s a word for this preview of socialized medicine under Obamacare.

Call it Flutrina."

Story by Michael Shannon at The Absurd Report

How the public option is working in Florida

You've probably read about insurance companies pulling out of Florida, and wondered about that. Well, Florida has a "public option" for property insurance. How's that working? They're waiting for the big one, and other policy owners are paying a surcharge to support the public option. Sound familiar? From the Beacon Blog)

"After Hurricane Andrew hit Florida in 1992 some Floridians were having difficulty purchasing homeowners’ insurance. (The reason: rates are regulated, and at the regulated rates some properties are too great a risk.) So, the state government formed Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, which is owned and operated by the State of Florida.

As originally envisioned, Citizens would charge rates above those charged by private insurers, to make Citizens the insurer of last resort. Nevertheless, Citizens found plenty of customers.

After two bad hurricane seasons in 2004 and 2005 property insurance rates in Florida rose, and in his campaign for the office, current Governor Charlie Crist promised voters that if elected he would see that their property insurance bills “dropped like a rock.”

One tactic he used was to change Citizens’ rate structure so it was competitive with private insurers. His idea, like President Obama’s idea with health insurance, is that with a public option, private insurers would have to keep their rates in line or risk losing customers to the government insurer.

That’s what’s happened in Florida. Today about 30% of homeowners’ policies are written by Citizens, which is the largest property insurer in the state. It’s about to get bigger too. The largest private insurer, State Farm, had a rate request rejected last year, and now is pulling out of the state altogether (for property insurance; they’ll still insure your car). As the largest private insurer pulls out over a three-year period (that period negotiated with the state), Citizens will get an even larger share of Florida’s property insurance.

Everybody in Florida knows Citizens is a fiscal time bomb. Already, every Florida insurance policy (on homes, boats, cars, etc.) pays a surcharge that goes to Citizens, but Citizens still doesn’t have sufficient reserves to weather a major hurricane. When one comes, Florida taxpayers will be on the hook for the bill.

Globe trotting Obama is too busy

"In his first year in office, Barack Obama has visited more foreign countries than any other president. He's touched ground in 16 countries, easily outpacing Bill Clinton (three) and George W. Bush (eleven). It's an itinerary befitting a "citizen of the world."

But there's one stop Obama won't make. He has begged off going to Berlin next week to attend ceremonies commemorating the fall of the Berlin Wall. His schedule is reportedly too crowded. John F. Kennedy famously told Berliners, "Ich bin ein Berliner." On the 20th anniversary of the last century's most stirring triumph of freedom, Obama is telling them, "Ich bin beschäftigt" - i.e., I'm busy."

See Rich Lowry at Real Clear Politics

This is a no-brainer for him. It wasn't all about him like the campaign event in Berlin, and 20 years ago was not a good time for Marxists.

Rocco Landesman's suit

Recently I saw a color photo of Rocco Landesman, Obama's appointee to head the National Endowment of the Arts, wearing a shiny, glow in the dark, cream colored suit. It gave me hope for the 3 piece outfit I recently bought at the Cancer Discovery Shop for three dollars which is sort of shiny and the color of baby formula spit up. Apparently "matchy matchy" is out for women, but not for men in government who've come up through the entertainment industry (he was the producer of Angels in America about aids, homosexuals, closets and religion). There's an article about him in today's WSJ by Lee Rosenbaum with easily arranged descriptive sentences.

• veteran Broadway producer
  
• free wheeling
  
• brashly candid
  
• provocative
  
• St. Louis native who demeans Peoria, Illinois
  
• ridicules past NEA efforts
  
• partisan agenda
  
• Obama operative
  
• baited congressional critics
  
• [not] politically savvy
  
• father owned Crystal Palace caberet
  
• abrasive, combative
  
• vendetta against some arts non-profits

I can hardly wait. Sounds like we're in for more crucifixes in urine art.

It's not about health, energy or the environment

All Obama's policies reflect a core liberal mindset that spans policies and endures decades, according to Heritage Blog (and mine too if you've been following it).

And that is, "the willingness to forego jobs and wages for American workers to achieve other goals liberal policymakers deem more worthy. In the case of tax rates, [Laurence] Summers admits growth will be sacrificed at the altar of a soak-the-rich mentality married to the need to fund Obama’s spending surge.

Health care reform has become an excuse to expand the reach of government and levy even higher taxes. The new House health care bill has yet higher rates than Summers was talking about: another blow to jobs and wages.

Cap and trade, a.k.a. pack and move for what it would do to the nation’s manufacturing sector, is an explicit, enormous trade off of lower economic growth for environmental goals. Recognizing the damage this policy would do to the economy, proponents anxiously argue that a few “green jobs” building subsidized windmills can compensate for the millions of real jobs destroyed if this legislation reaches the president." Read the entire piece here.

New shoes and voting advice

This morning I went to Kohl's (15% off for seniors) to buy a replacement for my Nikes. This would be my third pair in 2009--having discovered that the way to combat hip pain in the middle of the night is to make sure I'm wearing sturdy shoes when exercising or walking during the day. So I did find an exact match for what I bought in the summer, Nike Steady VI, "Nike Steady VI Leather Women's Training Shoe, with textile upper and satin webbing detail." What attracted me to this shoe is its simplicity. It doesn't blink or bling, is plain white and relatively trim. Why women wear ugly fat purple and black shoes, I have no idea. If I do run an errand after exercise class I'm not embarrassed to walk into the grocery store. In fact, until I saw the photo, I didn't even realize the Nike logo was in grey--I guess I can't see it when I'm wearning them.

When I got to the check-out, the beautiful, young cashier noticed my "I voted today," sticker and asked me about the issues, because she was going to vote later--her first election. I told her there were 3 constitutional changes on the ballot, all unneccesary, and I specifically told her about Issue 2, because that's the one that has everyone confused by the conflicting ads. Is it pro-agribusiness or pro-animal rights? Or neither. I advised her (since that's what librarian types do) to vote no on all 3 because regardless of their merits or faults, it wasn't necessary to change the constitution to do what laws or regulations could do. The people in line behind me chimed in and agreed. They were in Columbus from a confluence of two other states that do have casinos (issue 3) and were vigorous in their condemnation of what happens, regardless of what money it brought to the state. Gambling always gets a foot in the door by pleading a good cause--like the lottery was going to solve all our education funding problems--but it's like opening the door to let out a fly, and bats, bees, and burglars come in.

I took a different route home because of the road construction in front of our house and you don't want to have to turn left going or coming. I passed a shopping center I used to frequent in my working days and was amazed by the changes, including a restaurant that is now under another name where my colleagues and I went many times.

Obama makes Bush his Blame Czar

"The Senior Adviser [Valerie Jarrett] seems to have forgotten that she is the power [fretting about the tea parties and town halls]. Admittedly, this is a recurring lapse on the part of the administration. There was Barack Obama only the other day, blaming everything on the president – no, no, silly, not him, the other fellow, the Designated Fall Guy who stepped down as head of state in January to accept the new constitutional position of Blame Czar. Musing on problems in Afghanistan, Obama blamed the "long years of drift" under his predecessor. The new president – OK, newish president – has been Drifter-in-Chief for almost a year but he's too busy speaking truth to the former power to get on top of the situation. It could be a while yet. In his more self-regarding moments, such as his speech to the United Nations, he gives the strong impression that the "long years of drift" began in 1776. Mark Steyn

Dear Mary Jo Kilroy

What are you people doing? HR3926 is even worse than the last one. And do you really believe that people your age with a serious illness like MS will be better served with Medicaid-lite? You are destroying one of the best health care systems in the world. Are you planning to give up your insurance and take the public option?

You have the worst e-mail template I've ever used. You don't use the extra 4 digits on your website--why do you want us to?

H.R. 3926

You can track it, or any legislation, here. Here is the pretty, but distorted and bloated, title: "To provide affordable, quality health care for all Americans and reduce the growth in health care..."

And there's a word of caution at the site: "This bill is very large, and loading it may cause your web browser to perform sluggishly, or even freeze. This is especially true for old and/or bad browsers. As an alternative you can download the PDF of the bill or read the text on THOMAS." And they were right. I clicked. It spun a bit, then sputtered.

If you can get to Washington by Thursday there is a protest being planned. They are ignoring our letters, phone calls and e-mail. Congress just doesn't get it. They should have cleaned up the mess in the government plans we already have wasting millions a year. But no. They wanted something even bigger and messier.

I don't know anyone who has had their health insurance cancelled for going beyond the limits of the policy, or for not disclosing a prior condition. I'm sure it happens. However, I do know several who have waited months or years through numerous appeals, and piles of documentation, waiting for some level of government to act on their case. We also know, that this bill will cut the benefits for seniors, and that will immediately put a burden on the "sandwich" generation who will then need to be doing more hands on care--along with that garden the President wants you to plant in the back yard, and the clothes line you'll need as we become energy starved. Oh, hope and change.

Third Party Power

All the talking heads and political hacks are painting the congressional race in NY-23rd as a rift in the Republican ranks. It is not. It is a third party candidate proving that the Republicans and Democrats can be made irrelevant in the face of tea party power. It is proving this in the full glare of the national spotlight. And the only way that the entrenched politicians can save their own bacon is by spinning the story to distract the public from the obvious truth. All the king-makers’ horses and all the king-makers’men cannot defeat an honest tea party patriot once ordinary Americans wake up.

Read about it at American Daughter.

Vote NO on Issue 2 Ohio

What is Issue 2?

Issue 2 is a ballot issue that Ohio voters will decide tomorrow, in the November 3, 2009 general election. The issue proposes an amendment to the Ohio Constitution that addresses the care of livestock in Ohio.

The ads are even more confusing than issue 3, sometimes making the same argument for and against. But having worked in the agriculture library for three and a half years and the veterinary medicine library for fourteen (yes, I know that's strange for a Russian major, Spanish/History minor), I'm very, very familiar with the animal rights organizations and agribusiness. Either way, I smell a rat. There is absolutely no need for this. All areas of agriculture and animal health are extremely regulated both for safety and health of humans and animals. No one needs to amend the Constitution for this any more than they need to amend the Constitution to fix sidewalks, repair sewers, or build wind mills.

It's important to remember--there is no definition for "family farm." Not in the dictionary, not in the state constitution. It's just a useful tool for advertising and can mean anything you want it to mean.

The Ohio Department of Agriculture already has the authority to do all the things this newly created board is supposed to do.

Ohio is well covered by animal cruelty laws.

No other state in the nation has anything like this, not even wacko California.

See "Legal Questions and Answers about Issue 2,
The Ohio Livestock Care Standards Board Ballot Issue"

Business Reply University of Illinois Foundation

Faculty Profile

The best and the brightest? Who?

"I don’t actually remember anyone accusing Obama’s team of being the best and brightest. I do remember one calling himself a Communist, another saying in public that Mao was her favorite philosopher, and another being Joe Biden. They were last seen picking a fight with Fox News that everyone agrees was idiotic, and getting in another public fight with their own handpicked general over the strategy they announced earlier this year." Dave Price at The blog formerly known as. . . commenting on Ted Sorenson's article

If you lived in the 60s, I guess all wars are Vietnam. Does anyone remember we abandoned our allies and sent millions to their deaths?

Isn't this how we got this mess?

Putting people into mortgages who couldn't afford them? And have you seen the fraud in the first period?

Administration Calls on Congress to Approve Key Housing Measures

"WASHINGTON, DC – Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan called on Congress to approve three important measures to improve housing and the housing market for Americans: extension of the First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit for a limited period, extension of higher loan limits for home mortgages, and secure funding for the Housing Trust Fund.

"We welcome efforts taken by Congress to extend the First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit for a limited period. This credit has brought new families into the housing market and contributed to three consecutive months of rising home prices nationwide," said Secretaries Geithner and Donovan. "In extending the credit, we urge Congress to include strict measures to combat tax fraud and protect responsible homeowners. We also urge Congress to act swiftly to extend the loan limits that currently apply to most mortgages, helping make rates more affordable for middle-class families. Finally, we will work with Congress to identify a financing source for the Housing Trust Fund, which will help provide decent housing for families hardest hit by the current economic downturn."

"These three measures will help support our efforts to stabilize the housing market by providing support for the recovery in housing prices, keeping mortgage rates low, and helping people who can afford their homes to avoid foreclosure," said Secretary Geithner.

HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan said, "These three measures provide comprehensive support to our recovering housing market and continued access to affordable housing. While extending the tax credit and higher loan limits will help promote homeownership, funding the Housing Trust Fund will provide assistance to renter households impacted by the economic crisis." " from U.S. Department of the Treasury, October, 29, 2009

It feels good to be a victim

AlfonZo has another one. Rapping about victicrats.

HT Michelle Malkin

Geithner and Rangel combating tax evasion?

I think this message from tax cheat Geithner about tax cheat Rangel would be amusing if we can laugh and gag all at the same time.

"The legislation introduced today by Chairman Rangel and Chairman Baucus follows through on the Administration's commitment to combating offshore tax evasion and ensuring a level playing field. For too long, individuals have taken advantage of the system by hiding money in accounts overseas, while millions of families and small businesses here at home pay the price. This legislation will reduce the amount of taxes lost through the illegal use of hidden accounts and is the next step in making sure that everyone pays their fair share.

"This legislation fits well into the Administration's dual-track strategy of improving our domestic tax laws while increasing global cooperation on tax information exchange to help narrow the tax gap and create the fairer tax system we need. We have had great success recently in working with countries around the world to increase tax information exchange as part of the global effort to end offshore tax evasion.

"In addition to the leadership of Chairman Rangel and Chairman Baucus, I want to acknowledge the work of Senators Kerry and Levin and Representatives Neal and Doggett in support of a strong international tax enforcement agenda."

Rangel has out of the country real estate that rents for over $1000 a night but he claims just a mild oversight for 20 years. You try that. Geithner misreported his overseas income until he was caught, and then continued.

And these are the non-Marxists in the administration! Yikes.

ObamaCare and your insurance premiums. There’s no free lunch.

Despite indignant Democratic denials, the near-certainty is that their plan will cause costs to rise across the board. The latest data on this score come from a series of state-level studies from the insurance company WellPoint Inc. Using their own data it modeled ObamaCare in 14 states. Democrats who can‘t read their own bills or return calls and e-mails of worried voters, were lightning fast on trashing WellPoints data:

In all of the 14 states WellPoint scrutinized, ObamaCare would drive up premiums for the small businesses and individuals who are most of WellPoint's customers. (Other big insurers, like Aetna, focus on the market among large businesses.) Young and healthy consumers will see the largest increases—their premiums would more than triple in some states—though average middle-class buyers will pay more too.

Not even two hours after Wellpoint had presented its materials on the Hill, Democrats were already trashing it—which, considering that it runs to some 238 pages and took weeks to prepare, must have required remarkable powers of digestion and analysis. Link

HT Pauli

Sensibly green

I would call it just good stewardship and being frugal, but these days, green is a marketing term too. This Bed and Breakfast, The Artist's Inn and Gallery, in Pennsylvania has an interesting list suitable for most people.

Green PAJAMAS

Go to Michelle Malkin’s blog and read her “small list of “Peace and Justice” shakedown organizations connected to SEIU” (ACORN‘s evil twin).

There are thousands of these groups, gobbling up money from foundations, churches, private corporations, individual donors, membership drives, United Way/community chest apportionments, state and local governments and the federal government. Not all are connected to ACORN like SEIU, of course and many do a lot of good. But they speak a common language and can easily be manipulated by the party in power through their financing. I call them PAJAMA Organizations--Peace and Justice and More Aid Organizations. There is every manner of non-profit set up to drain off even more tax and private money with special programs to “help the poor.” Much of this provides employment for a huge clutch of people from administrators to janitors. I sometimes think that if families earning less than $35,000 disappeared tomorrow, half the remaining citizens would be without jobs--and so would fill in the gap to keep the cycle going. At an earlier blog I wrote about the Ohio Housing Trust Fund (Ohio Dept. of Development), that resulted from an effort in 1990 to help the homeless and has managed to grow into a $56 million item in the state budget focusing on “moderate income housing.” Now they’re disbursing ARRA money, passing out $17 million for the homeless, putting on conferences at nice resorts and giving millions to organizations to recruit unpaid volunteers to help people winterize their homes. Not to worry--the national NHTF was signed into law by George W. Bush in 2008, and its budget is in the billions. I'm sure your state has one too.

The Peace and Justice movement is propped up by think tanks and academics, as well as the government--the government, universities and the non-profits are a co-dependent revolving door. Think John Podesta. Clinton retread, Obama's transition team, now taking in Obama's rejects into his $25 million a year think tank. I’ve done it myself, although not in the PAJAMA game. As a researcher in the early 80s I moved from university department to non-profit to state government to university all on federal money filtered through grants to the state and foundations as a self-employed contractor (that way they don’t have to pay benefits).

Many Peace and Justice organizations have been reengineered in the last decade to assure a steady income stream by bringing in “green” issues--very big in poverty programs now--just the way many marketed products are. I think a number are simply black “reparations” spray painted green. I just looked through the web-site of the library non-profit I worked for in the early 80s and the first item on the page was on “greening.” That should be worth a few bucks on the next grant.

NY RINO Scozzafava quits

She was a loser before she started. It was a mystery to me why she didn't run as a Democrat. Or weren't they having her either? Maggie thinks she wasted a huge amount of money.

HT Maggie's Notebook and Real Clear Politics.

Red grape skin may help sickle cell sufferers

"AUGUSTA, Ga. – An extract in red grape skin may be a new treatment for sickle cell disease, Medical College of Georgia researchers say. Link

The extract, resveratrol, a natural chemical typically found in red wine and various plants and fruits, has been found to induce production of fetal hemoglobin, which decreases the sickling of red blood cells and reduces the painful vascular episodes associated with the disease.

Most fetal hemoglobin production ceases after birth, but in patients where it remains the predominant form, it can result in fewer complications, says Davies Agyekum, a second-year Ph.D. student in the MCG School of Graduate Studies.

In sickle cell disease, abnormal hemoglobin causes red blood cells to sickle. The abnormal shape impedes blood's passage through vessels and can cause excruciating pain and other complications because of the blood's oxygen deficiency.

Davies is working with Dr. Steffen E. Meiler, vice chair of research for the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine, on an eight-week animal study to determine if the combined anti-inflammatory and fetal hemoglobin-producing properties of resveratrol, a dietary polyphenol, can reduce the severity of sickle cell disease.

Hydroxyurea, an anti-cancer agent and the only Food and Drug Administration-approved therapeutic drug for sickle cell disease, increases fetal hemoglobin. Davies says reseveratrol-based therapy might be easier on patients.

The Ghana native recently received a three- to five-year $15,000 scholarship from the Southern Regional Education Board State Doctoral Scholars Program, a program aimed at increasing the number of minority students who earn doctoral degrees and become college and university professors."

One of the worst education stories I've read

A blogger from Detroit who has a fascination with photographing abandoned buildings came upon a middle school building abandoned in 2007. I was browsing his photos of the library (it would rip out the heart of any librarian) and then found this horror story. He could find no one who cared, so he's destroying the stash himself.

"After my first visit to the shattered middle school, I am haunted by what I found in one office: hundreds of file folders containing student psychological examinations complete with social security numbers, addresses, and parent information. I sat and thumbed through them. Many contained detailed histories of physical and sexual abuse, stories of home lives so horrifying I still can't get them out of my head: sibling rape, torture, neglect that defies belief. The detailed reports explained emotional impairments, learning disabilities. There was another box full of IEPs. The dates revealed that many of these students are still in the school system somewhere. I found several of their faces in the 2007 yearbook.

I spend the next few months trying to track down someone who cares. I send e-mails to the school's former principal, offering to go back and collect these records for her or destroy them. She never responds. I call my mom, a retired special education teacher and erstwhile administrator to determine the extent of malfeasance. Then I call the school district's legal department and leave voice mails warning them of the liability of this gross violation of student privacy. I never receive a response. I track down the school psychologist to some address in Troy. Nothing. It turns out a daily newspaper reported abandoned records like these within many of the 33 schools closed in 2007 and the district did nothing. No one is responsible. Someone else was supposed to destroy them. The company that had been paid to secure the school never did its job."

It's enough to make you homeschool, isn't it? And to cry for those poor, pitiful children that no school, no matter how good, will ever be able to save. But what excuses do the adults--the administrators of Detroit's school system have? They took the tax money to teach, test, classify and pigeon hole the children, and then abused them yet one more time. I'm ill. I'm sorry I read this.

Is Obama a Muslim?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tCAffMSWSzY

Did he lie to us during the campaign? I watched this video, and although it is disturbing, it's hard to know how much has been edited out which may have explained the statements. I see what the left does to Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck to rile up the net wackos and extremists, watched that Congressman distort and lie about the Republican health care plans, and I'm sure it can happen with our President.

He says he is a Christian, I've heard his Christian testimony, so I'll accept him at his word. Christians aren't saved by what they do or say, but by the work of Jesus Christ on their behalf. If he IS a Muslim, as the video purports, then blacks, homosexuals and women should be the most worried. Plus it would make him a infidel for claiming he's a Christian.

What I found deeply disturbing was hearing him talk in the glowing terms about other countries, their accomplishments and culture (Muslim all) and yet he doesn't have a decent, kind, knowledgeable word to say about his own. Birthers believe he was born in Kenya; I sometimes think he was born in another century or on another planet, he's so out of touch with what it means to be an American! That obsequious, smarmy behavior in itself ought to clue the Muslim leaders and our own that something's very fishy about this guy.

Seven months ago

I didn't buy into The Obama Deception movie conspiracy theories, which was also extremely hostile toward Bush. But here's what I said on April Fools day this year, and that hasn't changed. His poll numbers are plummeting here in Ohio, both for job, economy and the war, so others are catching on to what many knew even in 2007. This misnamed "health care reform" [it's health care take-over], the clap and trade bill, the bowing and butt kissing to foreign enemies and banana republic dictators, the sneering at our history and accomplishments--it's all taking a toll in the polls.

Someone said on the film, forgotten who, that if they cataloged all his lies, the film would never end, because they continue. Yes, I'd agree with that charge, too. It is truly amazing that a man who worked as a "community organizer" for nearly a decade, and never became a tenured law professor or wrote a law article or even practiced law, but wrote 2 autobiographical books, got hired by Illinois to represent a district for which he did nothing and which is still poor, and then got elected President on the basis of his looks and ability to speechify and talk black (something he had to learn as a foreign language as an adult). Call it a conspiracy against the American people if you wish, but really, Obama simply makes us look like a bunch of vacuous fools. . .if we're so great and wonderful and good, why would we let this happen?

Take off your apron, Mom

I'm going through the photo albums, starting with the piles of extras, to select some for a special album to display at our 50th celebration next year. I thought this one was sort of funny, taken at Lakeside summer of 1984 with our friends Ron and Jane who had come up for the day from Columbus. I'm always reminding people to take off their sun glasses when being photographed, but apparently I forgot to take off my apron. We were all thinner, didn't wear glasses yet, and had more hair, and I still use that apron purchased at one of the Lakeside antique shops twenty-five years later.

A few years ago we attended Ron and Jane's 50th, a surprise party at a downtown hotel--they thought they were going out for dinner with their daughter and son-in-law who live in Ireland, and their sons who live locally. It was a great party, but we'll be doing something a bit more modest. Jane is a retired RN and Ron for years owned a painting business. Now he leads a Bible study my husband attends each week for which he produces reams of research and personal thoughts. We met them when we were all members of First Community Church back in the 1960s.

World's cutest studio

Sandy blogs at Thistle Cove Farm. A serious artist with the world's most adorable studio.

1,990 page health care reform bill--on line for 72 hours

Bob C. writes: "Why so many pages and who, in just 72 hours, could even hope to read it let alone understand it??!! If asked and told not to lie, how many in Congress could honestly tell you they had read ALL of it and UNDERSTOOD all of it??

This is a big deal folks and somehow, no matter how it turns out (this way, that way, anyway) I have a distinct feeling that a year or two from now a LOT of people (more than a simple majority) will be saying "Oh s___!! What have we done this time??" Look back at the history of such things and list the positive results from government programs like this. A small Post-it pad should do. And after the fact, how many of the negatives have EVER been corrected??"

Jack Cafferty of CNN notes the length of other important documents for comparison.

• The original draft of the 1935 Economic Security Act, which established the Social Security Administration was 64 pages
  
  
• The Civil Rights Act of 1964 - forbidding discrimination based on race and sex: 8 pages
  
  
• The 19th amendment to the Constitution, giving Women the right to vote in 1920: 1 page
  
  
• The Emancipation Proclamation, with which Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves in 1863: 5 pages
  
  
• Or, if you really want to get back to basics: The Declaration of independence came in at 1 page in 1776
  
  
• And the Constitution: 4 pages long in 1787
  
  
• Health care reform, Pelosi version - almost 2,000 pages.

It's not Halloween--it's Detroit

Photo from Sweet Juniper and there are many more

Feral Detroit. What handing out entitlements and destroying the white middle class will get you. The President needs to tour some of these neighborhoods where the current mayor Dave Bing "recalls how, during the campaign, he would travel through neighborhoods where only a house or two remained occupied on each block, where weeds had reclaimed abandoned lots, and where storefronts sat empty. Today, officials estimate, the city contains an astonishing 70,000 abandoned structures—many of them houses, but also some commercial properties. In downtown Detroit alone, a local newspaper identified 48 office buildings with “no outward sign of life.” " . . .

"Though some blame Detroit’s population losses on larger economic forces, economists Edward Glaeser and Andrei Shleifer argue in a groundbreaking paper that the city’s problems are mostly self-inflicted. (The paper, called “The Curley Effect,” gets its name from legendary Boston mayor James Curley, who favored Irish residents and pushed other groups out.) After winning election in 1973, Detroit’s first black mayor, Coleman Young, consolidated his power, driving white residents, who had voted against him, out of the city by withdrawing services from their neighborhoods. Eventually, Glaeser and Shleifer write, Detroit became “an overwhelmingly black city mired in poverty and social problems”—and shrinking fast." From City Journal, Autumn 2009.

The cash for clunkers clunk

Now the White House is going after Edmunds for telling the truth.



"A total of 690,000 new vehicles were sold under the Cash for Clunkers program last summer, but only 125,000 of those were vehicles that would not have been sold anyway, according to an analysis released Wednesday by the automotive Web site Edmunds.com.

Still, auto sales contributed heavily to the economy's expansion in the third quarter, adding 1.7 percentage points to the nation's gross domestic product growth. [That's a gummit lie because moving government money around is not expansion.]

The Cash for Clunkers program gave car buyers rebates of up to $4,500 if they traded in less fuel-efficient vehicles for new vehicles that met certain fuel economy requirements. A total of $3 billion was allotted for those rebates.

The average rebate was $4,000. But the overwhelming majority of sales would have taken place anyway at some time in the last half of 2009, according to Edmunds.com. That means the government ended up spending about $24,000 each for those 125,000 additional vehicle sales." Money CNN